A Technocrat at Wit's End
by drummerguy32
Summary: No matter how deeply you suppress it, no matter how well you atone for it, no matter how you try to rationalize it - your past will never go away. Set after MGSV: TPP. Rated T for language and heavy topics (i.e. depression, suicide)
1. Adrift

_"One day he'll see through the lies he's built up, realize what kind of man he really is. What goes around comes around. You can't run from yourself forever."_ _\- Revolver Ocelot_

* * *

12:31, August 24th, 1984 - South Atlantic Ocean

High noon. Not a cloud in the sky. Nothing but ocean in sight. The heat was unbearable. As the scientist continued to sit in the raft in a morose silence, sweat enveloped his forehead like bot flies digging out of his brain. He unscrewed his canteen. Last one. His provisions, small as they were to begin with, were running low. He took a small sip. _Hard to believe they'd allow me enough supplies for this long_ , the scientist mused bitterly, _the monsters_. Screwing the cap back on, he peered into his box to check on his food situation. Two more rations. Stomach growling, he heaved a sigh, readjusted his glasses, and went back to thinking.

He'd done a lot of it in the past few days, it was true. Most of that thought was directed at the events that had transpired those past few days ago. He was an innocent man; how anyone could think otherwise was beyond him. He wasn't responsible for Strangelove's death. That damn pod had framed him! He didn't intentionally sabotage the quarantine facility. How was he supposed to know that the X-rays would mutate the wolbachia? He sure as hell didn't give Sahelanthropus to the child soldiers! They tricked him! Thoughts like these looped over and over in his head as he sunk further and further into hatred. Snake, Miller, even Ocelot… He'd been so cooperative to them and their glorified terror group, and this is how they decided to repay him? Unbelieveable. That's all he could think of to describe it. Unbelieveable. He scratched his beard.

Today, a new thought crossed his head. As the sun beamed down on his moist skin, sweat exiting out of every pore, and his eyes fixated on the provisions box, he thought to himself: _Am I going to die out here?_ Three days. That's how long he'd been out at sea, and, ever since Mother Base disappeared from the horizon, he'd not seen a single sign of life, not a single man-made structure or vessel on the horizon. The implications frightened him. If he died, there would be no man in the world able to counter the threat of the Diamond Dogs. They'd appropriated his designs, originally created with the intention of enforcing peace, mind, for their own wicked ends. He shuddered to think of what an army of Battle Gears could do. Another implication crossed his head, making him tremble. Hal, he thought to himself as tears came to his eyes. He would never see his son again all because of Stranglelove, _that meddler, that bitch, that_ -

He cut himself short. Rather, he concentrated on letting his tears flow.

His vision became watercolor. The sea, jagged as it appeared before, seemed blended together as though it had calmed. Teardrops smudged his lenses, further obscuring his sight. Through his sobbing, he thought he could see a black dot in the distance, but he paid it no mind. It then hit him: Snake knew that no one would rescue him out at sea! He knew that after a few days provisions would run out! Of course - it was all obvious! Snake wasn't content with simply killing him like Miller was, no. That would have been too simple. _He must have intentionally left me with enough provisions to make me feel like I had a chance at survival_ , the scientist thought to himself, _only for me to find out that I was stranded at sea and slowly dying_. The sadistic bastard. The scientist's sorrow quickly turned to fury once more.

Again, he noticed the dot on the horizon. Was… was it getting bigger? He couldn't tell for sure, water still clouding his vision. But if it was… The scientist sniffled. He couldn't rule out the possibility of a gunboat sent after him by the Diamond Dogs. Sending a man out to sea with the illusion of freedom only to snatch it away from him at the last moment - it seemed exactly like the sort of thing they would do. _No_ , he denied, _if it were a gunboat, I'd be able to tell by now_. So, what was it? Like a lunatic, the scientist began to giggle. Could it be? He would be saved? Saved?! The giggling turned into a sort of mad laughter, as if he'd just overheard a grown man saying that Santa Claus existed. The tears still kept coming.

In spite of his blurred vision, the scientist began to make out what exactly was coming for him. On the horizon, it was no bigger than his thumb, but he assumed it to be a hulking ship. He could make out little splashes of color: white on the top, black in the middle, red on the bottom. A cargo ship? Wiping his brow, he narrowed his vision to try and make out more details, but to no avail. One thing was certain, though - the ship was getting closer. He knew it wasn't close enough. He knew there was no way in hell anyone on board would hear him or even see him at this point. But still, the scientist needed to scream. Drawing a deep breath, he pulled from his gut every strong emotion he'd felt in the past few days and cried at the top of his lungs:

"HEYYYYYYY! OVER HERE! HEEEEEEEELLLLLLP!"

* * *

8:23, August 25th, 1984 - Lagos, Nigeria

The scientist yawned. The sleep he'd gotten on the tanker the night before was tenuous at best, but now, he was in the American consulate's waiting room, sitting in anticipation as a young tourist couple in front of him were reporting their stolen passport. He could hardly believe it. After eleven years - eleven hellish years - he would be going back home to his family, to his son. How calming it would be to finally return to a life of normalcy, to a life of peace.

"Next!" spoke the man from behind the glass window through a speaker. The scientist eagerly rose from his seat and, with the help of the crutches the tanker's medical staff had given him, made his way to the window. "What can I help you with today?" the receptionist inquired, a look of iron professionalism on his face. The scientist cleared his throat.

"Hello, my name is Huey Emmerich. I've been out o-"

"Huey Emmerich?" the receptionist interrupted, a look of surprise on his face.

"Yes, sir, is something the matter?" Emmerich replied, confused. When did his name warrant surprise?

"...One moment, sir," the receptionist spoke, getting up from his desk. He disappeared into the a back room, leaving a bewildered Huey to wonder what was going on. A cold sweat broke out across the scientist's forehead. Something was wrong. He'd been affiliated with criminals for the past ten years, sure, but he was never the one doing the bad stuff! Yet the way the receptionist reacted to his name… Nervously, he tapped his fingers against the handles of his crutches. After about a minute of waiting in stifling silence, save for the hissing of the ventilation system, the receptionist reappeared, looking more at ease. "I'm sorry about the inconvenience. If you will," he apologized, motioning for Huey to continue.

"W-well," the suspicious scientist stammered, "As I was saying, I-I've been out of the country for more than a decade. T-though I was initially out to work with the CIA in Central America, I w-was kidnapped by a band of terrorists and passed around l-like a, like a living machine between different terrorist groups w-working on deadly weapons for ten years until just a few days ago. Please, sir, c-can you help me? I just want to see my family. I just want to see my son."

As he spoke that last sentence, his trembling voice was slightly caught in his throat. He gulped and stared at the receptionist in quiet desperation. The receptionist gave a small smile. "I do believe that we can help you," he replied, "But we're gonna need you to fill out this form here." The receptionist slipped out a piece of paper from the slot in the glass window. "After you get done with that, I'll be in contact with my superiors. Have you got a shelter you can stay in for the next few days?" he further inquired. Huey, still a bit wary, shook his head. "Very well, I'll see if I can make arrangements with my superiors for a nearby hotel. With any luck, we should have an update on your reentry in two days."

"Oh, thank god," Huey sighed, reaching for the paper, "I'm telling you, it's been a rough time going for me, but knowing that I can go home-"

With a bang, the front door opened. Two Nigerian men, dressed in a black uniform and donning berets, briskly entered the waiting room. A murmur rose from those also in the waiting room. "NP!" one shouted. Huey froze, staring at one of them like a deer in the headlights. The man, noticing Huey's state, stared back and asked with a deep, accented voice, "Huey Emmerich?" Huey, gulping, nodded. In response, the man pulled out a badge. A police officer. "You are under arrest," he announced plainly, as the officer to his side moved toward Huey.

As the officer approached, Huey took one final look back at the receptionist. Though it was only a glance, the scientist could have sworn he saw the receptionist gazing back, a look of malice in his eyes. _Liar_ , Huey hissed with his eyes. "Next!" came the receptionist's voice from the speaker.

* * *

 _ **OOC:** Hey, guys, hope y'all enjoyed this first chapter. This is my first ever real go at fanfiction writing; for years, I've toyed around with ideas but never really committed to anything because, ultimately, I feel like the stories I wanted to tell were all superfluous or ones that I didn't feel confident in expressing. After playing MGSV, however, I, like many others, was left with several questions. There were still eleven years unaccounted for in the Metal Gear timeline: the period between 1984 and 1995. So many years abandoned, so many stories left untold, and the one I was most interested in was the story of what happened to Huey after his exile. See, we already know that he commits suicide in 1997, far after the events of Phantom Pain, but we only get a vague explanation as to why in TPP itself (see: the quote at the top of the page). Seeing as how we're probably never going to see another main series Metal Gear game again (at least, one developed by Kojima), I've taken it upon myself to explore the downfall of Huey Emmerich a bit further. Expect to see young Otacon, Julie Dazinger, the end of the Cold War, the rise of the Patriots, and so forth as we get further into the story. Any and all reviews would be appreciated - I'm new to all of this and would be extremely receptive to any criticism you guys may have!_


	2. Beseiged

17:15, August 28th, 1984 - CIA interrogation room, Location unknown, United States of America

Huey was terrified. This situation was all too familiar. Tied down to a chair, facing a one-way mirror, being interrogated for things that weren't his fault, a "handler" in the same room as him to keep him talking. Already, he was beginning to sweat. His "handler," an older-looking, muscular man, sat in a chair to his right, arms and legs crossed, shades down. Was he awake? Huey, in his shaken state of mind, couldn't tell. A crackle came on over the intercom in the room.

"Sooo… Dr. Huey Emmerich," spoke a bemused, gruff voice, "We've been tracking you down for close to a decade, now, did you know that? Yes, we've got quite the file on you. Well, you and everyone else involved in the MSF." The distorted sound of rustling papers came through the intercom. "It's a curious thing," the interrogator mused, "You and Big Boss both fell of the face of the Earth after the attack on Mother Base. There wasn't a trace of you anywhere for nine years. We thought we'd had a lead on your location last year when, out of the blue, your son showed up on your mother's doorstep in Manhattan."

"Hal…" the worried scientist murmured under his breath.

"But sadly, it proved inconclusive. Whoever it was that smuggled that child from wherever the hell you were did a damn fine job covering their tracks," the interrogator continued, "Eventually, a few months later, we find out you're helping Big Boss again in his new venture, Diamond Dogs. But all of a sudden, just a few days ago, you show up in Nigeria at the American consulate in Lagos out of nowhere. Doctor, what in the hell did you expect would happen, entering an American governmental facility and revealing yourself like that?"

"Y-you're acting as if I wanted to be involved with them in the first place!" Huey spoke back dismissively, "I was forced against my will to join MSF! And then for a decade after that, I was passed back and forth between terror groups before managing to escape to Lagos! Everything I did for them, I did under the threat of punishment for insubordination. I-I'm no terrorist! I'm just a scientist who happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time!"

"Wrong place at the wrong time, huh?" the interrogator mocked with a chuckle, "I'll say. You were already participating in illegal operations in Costa Rica when you first came into contact with Big Boss."

 _Illegal operations in Costa Rica?!_ , Huey thought to himself, _what the hell is h_ \- Suddenly, it occurred to him. Coldman. "H-Hot Coldman was CIA, though!" he retorted.

"Rogue CIA," spoke the man in the chair at last, "He was rogue by the time you came into contact with him. And yet, you took his job and worked it enthusiastically, or so we understand. The Peace Walker Project… You went and created a machine that nearly destroyed the entire world. Why is that, doctor?" Unfolding his arms and legs, the man turned in his chair to face Huey. The scared scientist took a deep breath before responding.

"Deterrence," he spoke calmly, "For all of my career as a scientist, I have been a proponent of nuclear deterrence as a means of sustaining world peace, and-"

"Is that so, doctor?" interrupted the man in sunglasses, a bemused expression on his face, "Then let's talk about that one similar robot you built for MSF. 'ZEKE', was it?" Huey jumped slightly. .

Quickly losing the calm he'd had moments before, he nervously responded, "Z-Z-ZEKE… was built with that goal in mind! It was constructed and armed with a nuke to act as a deterrent against countries who saw MSF as a threat!"

"A deterrent? Or a bargaining chip?" the man in sunglasses pressed, "Doctor, surely you understand that any nuclear-armed nongovernmental mercenary group - especially one on the United States' doorstep - would be seen as an international threat by any world power. MSF may have just been a PMC, but they were a PMC operating outside of international jurisdiction and acting with little regard for international law. It would be no different if you gave nuclear capabilities to, say, the PIRA or Hezbollah. No militant group should have all that power."

"Th-that's what I thought too!" Huey agreed, "But I was forced to work for them. Forced! I-I was only obeying orders!"

"Classic words, those," the man in sunglasses said, standing up, "That's the exact same defense the Nazis used at Nuremberg, did you know that?" Pacing behind Huey, the man placed his hand on the trembling scientist's shoulder. A jolt flew down Huey's spine. "And those sunsabitches didn't exactly get off easy, did they?" he finished, bending down so as to speak in Huey's ear.

"Creating weapons that threaten to plunge the world into a state of nuclear war for rogue militant groups is criminal activity, whether you were following orders or not," came the voice from the intercom, "But we've got evidence that paints you a liar." Huey, at first taken aback, held firm.

"You're bluffing…" he said facing the floor.

"You can believe what you want to believe, Doctor," the man in sunglasses told Huey, "but the fact of the matter is you're wrong. The CIA has eyes everywhere. Ten years ago on Mother Base, we had multiple agents among Big Boss' men: in the Combat Unit, in R&D, in the Sick Bay, even in the Mess Hall. Our eyes were on MSF like a hawk until its destruction."

Chills shot down Huey's spine. He could remember wondering ten years ago, after Paz had hijacked ZEKE, exactly how many of Mother Base's staff were loyal to Snake and how many reported to outside powers, but thought little of it in the days after. Now, it was all coming back to bite him in the ass. The intercom flickered on again. The doctor could hear the rustling of paper over the intercom. The smoking gun.

"Let's see here…" the man behind the mirror spoke, presumably leafing through his papers, "We've got this report here from an agent in R&D dated November 19th, 1974… says right here, you were ecstatic to hear of Big Boss's takedown of 'Chrysalis,' whatever that is. Another sentence here says there was a general buzz in the lab over your 'pet project' mech. Huh." Strike one. More rustling. "Another report, dated November 23rd, 1974… Apparently you were left in charge of a skeleton crew at Mother Base while the rest of the staff went of to destroy Peace Walker. Hm. Quite the responsibility to entrust to a man who had to be forced into following orders." Strike two. More rustling. "Oh, this is an interesting one. November 28th, 1974. A soccer game between Costa Rican and Nicaraguan staff on Mother Base, with a certain Dr. Emmerich as a referee… You seem to really like palling around with these terro-"

"Okay, fine, I admit it!" Huey interjected, having had enough, "I was committed to the growth and success of MSF as a means of advancing the concept of nuclear deterrence. I cooperated with them, I befriended them, I… trusted them." Huey looked back down at the floor and sighed. "By creating Metal Gear ZEKE and arming it with a nuclear weapon, I was hoping that MSF would become a neutral nuclear power outside the ideological bounds of communism or capitalism - kind of like India," he explained, "except that's not exactly the most apt comparison. In being a nuclear-armed, militaristic entity outside of US or Soviet influence, MSF could force the USA and the USSR to unite in opposition to it, essentially transforming nuclear deterrence into world peace. We could have ended the Cold War!"

"While I find your aspirations admirable, Doctor," the man in sunglasses said, coming back around to face Huey, "I can't help but think of a few reasons why they're a bit misguided, if not stupid. For starters, a nuclear-armed PMC committed to world peace… Sounds like a bit of an oxymoron, doesn't it? I'd see where you were coming from a bit more if it were a militant Greenpeace on that off-shore plant, but MSF's whole raison d'etre in the first place was the proliferation of conflicts worldwide through hired guns. They made a living off of raising hell, off of continuing the Cold War via proxy wars. They were the antithesis of world peace."

His ideas dismantled, the doctor struggled to think of a retort. "As if what the CIA does around the world is any more commendable!" he snapped back.

"So, now you're _defending_ MSF?" chuckled the man in sunglasses in response, his back turned to the doctor. Huey, stammering, could not think of a response. The man turned around, walked over to Huey, and got in his face. "What we do is irrelevant to the conversation at hand," he snarled, "The fact of the matter is, doctor, you're still guilty of nuclear proliferation with a militant group outside international jurisdiction." The gravity of the situation was starting to hit the scientist at full force. He grit his teeth, so as to hold onto his sanity. He was in the right, he _knew_ it.

"We're not done with you yet, Dr. Emmerich," the voice over the intercom came again, "Agent Johsnon, the photo, if you will." The man in sunglasses nodded and made his way back to his chair. Huey, following his movements, noticed a manila folder on the floor next to the chair that he hadn't before. _What are they doing now?_ , the scientist seethed internally, _Pouring salt in the wound?_ In a swift motion, the agent bent down and picked up the manila folder.

"Tell me, Doctor," Agent Johnson said, pulling out a Polaroid photo while approaching Huey, "You wouldn't happen to know anything about this, would you?" Huey gazed at it. Within the framed shot, there was something like a dry, hilly landscape with sparse shrubbery just barely illuminated by the moonlight, nothing special… But then he saw it: a dark shadow just over one of the ridges with little red lines and circles partly illuminating a shiny exterior of… No.

"A field agent of ours was out in the Afghan countryside north of Kabul some months ago, preparing to attack the Soviets' central base camp in the area with some Mujahideen," explained Agent Johnson, "when all of a sudden, something falls down from the sky right near the entrance! It's this… beast. Looks like a giant walking reptile. Next thing he knows, it lets loose this earpiercing shriek."

Huey knew that shriek - the shriek of a jaguar mixed with a red-tailed hawk mixed with a bear. Slung over Snake's shoulder, a bag over his head, barely able to breathe but heart pounding, bouncing up and down on the back of a horse… he remembered that shriek. He remembered the silence that filled the air save for the dreaded footsteps of that infernal machine. _Sahelanthropus_. Had the room gotten hotter all of a sudden…?

"As soon as that thing let out its scream and started shooting these thunderous machine guns at… well, something - it was the middle of the night," the agent droned on, going back to pacing around the room, "his Mujahideen buddies were terrified and their commander gave the order for a retreat. Fortunately for us, our agent stuck around long enough to take this photo. So, here's the question: what the hell is that thing?"

The scientist couldn't answer. He was buried in his own memories. The feeling of dread as the pounding of the gatling guns got closer and closer to the horse, the warped grunts of a gorrilla sounding in the distance, the whirring noises of the observer drones sent out to hunt its prey. The Doctor's trembling worsened. His breathing quickened. He was basting in sweat. He was staring down at the floor. He was-

"Doctor!" yelled the agent right in Huey's face, breaking the scientist out of his past, "Answer the damn question! What in the hell did our field agent see?"

"I-I have no idea!" Huey yelled back, "I've n-never seen that thing in my life!" The next thing he knew, he was on his side, face stinging like it had just had a brick thrown at it. His glasses had flown off at the blow, rendering him blind.

"You goddamn LIAR!" barked the agent, "You're seriously starting to piss me off with how badly you're trying to cover everything up! If you've never seen anything like that giant machine, then why are you as pale as a sheet? No - the truth is, you have seen that thing before, and it scared the hell out of you. You know that machine. You know what it's capable of. So, again, I ask: what… the hell… IS IT?" Tears started to creep out of the doctor's eyes. He wasn't crying, just… leaking.

"...Sahelanthropus," he stated after a moment, "Metal Gear Sahelanthropus. I was forced to create that machine for nine years after MSF." He sniffed.

"Again with the whole 'forced' thing…" groaned the agent, "And who 'forced' you to create it, doctor? Big Boss? He was vanished for those nine years, same as you, yeah?"

"No!" Huey strongly denied, "It wasn't Snake… his name was… Skull Face."

"Skull-!" the agent, surprised, exclaimed. Silence filled the room then. Huey sniffed again.

"Please… No more…" Huey begged, "You've ripped into me enough for one day, haven't you?"

The intercom flickered on. "Agent Johnson, come in here for a bit. I need to discuss something with you," spoke the voice. Gazing down at Huey and grunting, the agent complied, exiting the room and leaving the scientist to himself.

The perspective from the floor, to Huey, always seemed humbling. That much he learned when he was a baby. It was even worse without glasses. That much he learned when he was bullied in elementary school. It was even worse while tied to a chair. That much he learned at Mother Base. But what he felt now was new. The sheer sense of helplessness he felt in his current situation was overbearing. Here, he faced two government employees, not people with whom he'd been acquainted with in the past, who found him guilty of serious crimes. This time, there would be no levelheaded person to come in and save him at the last minute, no one who would believe his side of the story. Without his glasses, the grey walls and fluorescent lights seemed to blur together. He pondered further what would happen to him. At best, he would be sentenced to federal prison for a long time, if not for life. At worst…

The door opened. Huey nervously looked up again. Agent Johnson came in and made his way straight for Huey. "Hey, wait a minute, wait-" Huey objected, fearing some sort of punishment. In a moment, though he was facing rightways again. He then heard what he presumed to be the sound of his glasses being picked up off of the floor, a presumption confirmed when a few seconds later, he could see clearly again. What? The door shut.

"Okay, listen up, Doc," the agent spoke up grabbing the other chair in the room by its top rail and dragging it towards Huey. The chair's legs ground against the floor, producing a guttural noise of metal on tile. The doctor winced. Once the chair was in front of the other, the agent flipped it around so that its back was facing Huey and straddled it. "We aren't done questioning you yet. However, we're going to make you a deal," he announced. Agent Johnson removed his sunglasses, revealing a pair of stern, cloudy grey eyes. Stunned by the agent's words and actions, Huey dropped his jaw for a second before sputtering again.

"If you'll let me explain," Agent Johnson replied, holding up his hand so as to stop him. The doubtful doctor, gulping, nodded. "Do you see this?" the agent asked rhetorically, pulling out a small, metallic cylinder with a deactivated red bulb on top of it, "This is a tracking device. The Nigerian Police found it in one of your shoes after arresting you and handed it over to us when you were extradited. We know that, some time before your reappearance in Lagos, you were in the Diamond Dogs. If what you say is true and you managed to escape from them, someone is still keeping watch over you." Huey glowered. _So they thought I was a threat even when they left me with nothing?_ , he thought bitterly, _Of course they would_.

"Now, I feel I should correct myself about something I said earlier," the agent continued, "What I said about the CIA having eyes everywhere, that wasn't entirely true. The truth is, there have been organizations so well hidden or so well policed that it's been almost impossible for our agents to gather information on them. A few months ago, we had a few agents join Diamond Dogs to gather information on them and keep watch over them, much like our agents in MSF. That's how we know you were involved with them." Agent Johnson's face suddenly grew more grave, as though loathing what he was about to say. "However, in the nine years since the destruction of MSF," he went on, "it seems as though Kazuhira Miller and Big Boss have grown more paranoid of outside interlopers. Any information that our agents managed to send to us lacked in detail and was slow in coming, and to make matters worse, they started disappearing left and right. Our last report was two months ago. Our one remaining agent spoke of Miller transforming the base into an Orwellian nightmare. That was the last we've heard from him."

Huey, nodding, understood. From the limited time he spent outside of his lab, he could recall seeing soldiers always on edge, dropping whatever it was they were doing to salute Snake. Propaganda littered the shells. Like an omnipresent being, the image of the legendary Big Boss constantly loomed over all of the occupants, the caption underneath him reminding them of his unyielding gaze. Diamond Dogs was not a community built on camaraderie and merit like MSF, but rather one built on fear and loyalty. It wasn't a PMC, it was a cult.

"So, here's the deal," the agent concluded, "You were presumably close to those in charge of Diamond Dogs in your time there. As a source of intel, I can't imagine anyone more valuable save for those at the top. We need your information. We need you to tell us everything you know about Diamond Dogs: everything you saw, everything you heard, everything. No lies, no games-" he shot a glare at the doctor- "Just the truth. In return, we'll help hide you. We'll pull some strings and put you in a witness protection program, maybe even help you into to a nice, cozy job at DARPA so you can help the good guys for a change. Hell, you can even take your kid along, if you want. I assume whoever's after you knows about him, too." Offered this prospect, Huey's face lit up. A broken grin started to spread across his face. "But ONLY if you cooperate with us," the agent strictly emphasized, "If I so much as suspect you as lying, you can forget about living anywhere else but prison the rest of your life. Do we have a deal, doctor?"

The smiling scientist, the slightest hint of a mad giggle in his voice, responded, "...I'll tell you everything."


	3. Confliction

21:01, August 28th, 1984 - CIA interrogation room, Unknown location, United States of America

"...Unfortunately, my exoskeleton was too heavy to stay inside the life raft," Huey lamented to Agent Johnson, "I had to give up my legs in order to run away. I gave up the best part of those nine years in hell so that I could escape them!"

"How sacrificial of you," the agent responded, taking another sip of his coffee. They'd been at it for almost four hours now. Huey, taking the offer seriously, had divulged a wealth of information on Diamond Dogs that he'd accumulated from his time on Mother Base, mainly related to the R&D projects he'd been working on, while making sure to gloss over his own actions that he was not so proud of. Now, however, the doctor's story was almost at an end. As Huey went on about how he was lost at sea for days until being saved by an oil tanker, the agent continued to listen intently as evidenced by his iron gaze.

"The next morning, I was woken up by a dayworker who told me that we'd arrived in Lagos," Huey concluded, "With no passport or form of identification to my name, I knew that the only way I could return home was to get into contact with Americans in Nigeria. That's how I ended up at the consulate."

"Well, this has been quite the saga, Doctor," responded the agent while putting down his coffee mug, the slightest hint of weariness in his voice, "But there's one figure in this story in particular that I'm interested in hearing more about. You kept mentioning that, at least for the first half of your time on base, Diamond Dogs' prime objective was the destruction of XOF, the elimination of Skull Face. You said that with the destruction of Sahelanthropus, they succeeded, but you never expanded on what happened to any surviving XOF personnel, let alone Skull Face himself. I want to know - what happened to the bastard?" Drawing his question out, he looked straight into the doctor's eyes with a burning intensity.

"Well, when Sahelanthropus was wreaking havoc at Serak Power Plant, Skull Face himself got caught in the fray and got crushed from his waist down by a collapsing pylon," Emmerich explained, "After Snake had destroyed Sahelanthropus, Pequod picked him up and took all of us to the site of the downed pylon. Once we were there, Snake destroyed the remaining two strains of the English vocal chord parasite and then…"

As he described the scene to the agent, his memories kept on taunting him. Images flashed in his mind. Him walking for the Winchester, him picking it up, him loading the single bullet into the chamber, him pointing the weapon at Skull Face's bloodied head, him pulling back the hammer, him…

"They killed him. Snake and Miller both killed him for what he did to Mother Base nine years ago," Huey finished with a sigh. _He'd bled such a crimson red_ , he thought.

The agent was silent for a moment. His eyes looked upwards, as though processing the doctor's words. Finally, he smirked and looked back at the doctor. "Good," he said, "Bastard had it coming." Huey raised his eyebrows. "I was in XOF myself years ago, back in the 60s," the agent clarified to Huey, "Skull Face was my CO. Mean sonuvabitch. He always had this attitude about him, something like 'I won't hesitate to get back at you if you so much as look at me the wrong way.' I never felt like he was committed to serving the CIA, as if it were all just a means to an end for him. I ended up leaving the unit years later to work directly for the CIA because I couldn't tolerate him anymore. Doesn't surprise me to learn that the bastard was behind all this."

"You're telling me," Huey responded, "Anyways, after his death, surviving XOF forces scattered. A lot continued to fight under Cipher's leadership, where they presumably remain to this day." The doctor heaved a sigh and looked off to the side. "It's crazy, isn't it? While the Soviets and the USA are fighting a very sterile war with each other, there's another active war lying just underneath the surface between Diamond Dogs and Cipher," he commented, "One that could have ramifications as great as, if not greater, than the Cold War."

"Hm. Well, I don't think that will be the case for much longer," Agent Johnson responded, "We've had our eyes on both sides for a while now, limited as our sight has been. Rest assured, the United States is aware of their little war and will do everything in its covert power to weaken the threat that these two groups pose to global security. Your testimony has strengthened our understanding of the situation, and for that, we are grateful."

The gratitude of an agent who, hours earlier, offered only anger made Huey feel an odd amount of discomfort. "Well, I'm glad that I could help," Huey spoke, "But with all due respect, I don't think it will be that easy. You remember what I said earlier about Cipher having a hand in the operations of every major intelligence agency in the world, right? They're in the KGB, they're in MI6, they're even in-"

"You honestly think this is the first time the CIA's ever dealt with sleeper agents, Emmerich?" Agent Johnson huffed, "Hell, that we've even dealt with enemy spies in general? Doctor, if there's a traitor in our ranks, we're going to find him." He leaned in towards the doctor, eyebrows furrowed. "We're the CI-fucking-A," he hissed, "Not some third-world intelligence service. We don't need your concern. Any covert war Cipher tries to fight with us, we'll surely win. We have the full funding of the United States government behind us." Huey nervously leaned further back into his chair as a defense mechanism. Was it something he said?

"That's enough for tonight," the voice over the intercom piped up, the first time it had spoken in a while, "Agent Johnson, transfer Emmerich back to his cell. We'll wrap things up in the morning."

The agent looked back at the one-way mirror, nodded, and affirmed, "Yes, sir." Getting up from his seat with a weary grunt, he made his way behind Huey. A moment later, Huey could move his arms freely again. As the doctor continued to ponder the tense exchange that had just occurred, he could hear the sound of clattering metal. In a second, Agent Johnson was at his side, silently holding out Huey's pair of forearm crutches. The doctor thanked the agent and, firmly grabbing both crutches, pulled himself up from out of his chair and onto his feet. With the agent right behind him, Huey made his way out of the room through another side door back into the sterile hallways he'd been drug through hours before.

The atmosphere was conflicting. Huey, continuing through the halls while listening for instructions of when to turn, could swear that the air conditioning was far stronger than it was in the interrogation room. A tad too strong? All was silent save for the sounds of footsteps and his crutches hitting ground and Agent Johnson occasionally telling him to go left or right. Other agents occasionally passed by, some carrying stacks of paper. The interrogation had gone far better than expected. A weight had been lifted off of his chest. _So why_ , he wondered, _do I still feel like something's wrong?_ A single bead of sweat rolled down his forehead. A leftover from the interrogation room? He couldn't tell. The dull hallways, expanses of white bricks and gray doorways illuminated by fluorescent lighting, seemed to stretch on forever.

He felt a hand grip his shoulder. "Stop," ordered Agent Johnson, "It's the door to your left." Huey planted his crutches as the agent entered the passcode for the door to his side. With a high-pitched beep, the lock came undone. The doctor pivoted himself to face the door as the agent pulled it open. Within the room was a personal toilet and a simple cot - the site of where, just the night before, Huey had spent a sleepless night. Hobbling in, Huey made it over to the cot and sat himself down on it, making sure to carefully put his crutches on the ground. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see Agent Johnson leaning against the opened door, arms folded. He was grinning.

"You know, Emmerich," spoke the agent, "Frankly, I really don't like you. The way you shamelessly tried to cover your actions at the beginning of the interrogation in the face of mounds of evidence - and badly, I might add - tells me that you're the sort of person who's willing to do something horrific one moment but then backtrack on it the next if it means you'll gain some sort of leverage out of doing so. You're a sycophant. A brown-noser. A kiss-ass." Agent Johnson sneered this line, sending a shiver down the doctor's spine. Huey nervously avoided eye contact. Was this the bad aura that he'd felt? The agent sighed, "But I do thank you for giving us the information we asked of you. You've made some people in high places very happy today."

"I-I was just doing what you asked of me," Huey nervously chuckled in response with paper thin humility, "Nothing more."

"Naturally," the agent responded plainly, "My partner and I, we'll pull some strings, try and get you set up with some place to hide in DC and perhaps a job in Arlington. It may take a few days, but I'll tell you this much: you won't be in prison." Huey could feel a smile form on his face. He managed to look the agent in the eye. "America needs a good scientist like you on her side," Agent Johnson continued, "You may be a bastard, but you're our bastard now. In time, you'll become a valuable partner. A true patriot."

With that, the agent stepped out of the doorway, pushing the door closed behind him. Huey was left alone in his cell, continuing to stare at where the vanished agent had been. A smile remained on his face from the news that he would be free, yet somewhere in the back of his mind, the bad feeling that he'd felt earlier had not gone away.

* * *

17:57, September 1st, 1984 - Lower East Side Manhattan, New York City, New York, United States of America

Of all the things he'd missed about home, the driving wasn't one of them. Huey sat in the passenger's seat, gazing on as the Toyota in front of them was taking its sweet-ass time down the street. Even the stoic CIA agent who was driving the car was quickly losing his professional attitude; Huey could see the poor man's white knuckles out of the corner of his eye. Peering off to the side, Huey noticed a young boy taking his dog for a walk past an abandoned building covered in graffiti. This was not the place he grew up in, he knew. It wasn't even the place he'd visited for Thanksgiving or Hanukkah twelve years prior. Something about it had changed. On the surface, it seemed exactly as it had been decades ago, but the more he looked at the streets, he could notice subtle, sinister differences - cracked pavement, boarded-up windows, splashes of graffiti art, and so forth. Something had changed.

As the car continued down Stanton Street, Huey went over in his head what he would do once he arrived. He would knock on the door, talk to his mom about needing to take along Hal, maybe exchange a few pleasantries, and then leave. It couldn't be any simpler, he thought. And yet, his finger nervously tapped against his leg. The car radio continued to drone, playing the latest hits as dictated by one Casey Kasem. The car made a right. Soon, at any moment, he would be there. The driver seemingly knew this too, as his knuckles had returned to a normal shade of pink. Spotting a gap near the sidewalk, the agent steered his way towards it. A pressure was building in Huey's chest as the car effortlessly slid into the space.

Once outside, he took a deep breath. The setting sun bathed the buildings in an orange glow. Sounds of car horns and wheels on pavement filled his head. The city was still alive. "Remember," came the voice of the CIA agent behind him. Huey pivoted to face him. "You only get thirty minutes up there," the agent told the doctor while leaning out the window, "Any more than that and I'm under no obligation to stay."

"Of course," Huey nodded, remembering the deal that had been made the day before. He was allowed a brief window of time back in Manhattan in order to collect anything he needed, get his son, and say his goodbyes to his mother, but after that, he would be expected to be en route to Arlington. _"If you spend even a minute longer,"_ said Agent Johnson then in an exaggerated fashion that Huey had become familiar with by that point, _"we'll just assume you're not taking us seriously and leave you to the mercy of the Diamond Dogs."_ He could do this. He needed to do this. Wasting no more time, Huey made his way down the street towards an old brick tenement he used to call home.

While some of the shops and apartments around it were either replaced or abandoned, the tenement itself looked unchanged. It was surprisingly disability-friendly, Huey reflected - no stairs leading to the entrance or anything of the sort. It was a part of the reason why his parents had moved from Morningside Heights after the war. After his birth. After his paralysis had come to light. The doctor approached the doorway, luckily for him, just as someone was coming out. The person, a boy with jet black hair and brown skin, set down a laundry basket that they were carrying and held the door open for him. Huey, nodding at the gesture, focused on remembering the number of his parents' apartment. He knew it was on the first floor; his parents had made sure of that when they bought the apartment. But with more than a decade's worth of other information having processed through his head, it was difficult to pull out that one particular number.

He searched each doorway, looking at the golden numbers at the top of each frame. 10, 11, 12, 13, 14… What was it? Huey planted his crutches and exhaled to better collect himself. Why couldn't he remember? His fingers tapped hurriedly against the handles of his crutches. But then he saw it: a door with a chip in it. 1953. He was in his dad's lab tinkering around with parts and tools as he usually did, trying to find out if he could make a toy car that he could play with without having to carry it around everywhere. With his dad's reluctant help (he was doing research at the time, as usual, Huey remembered), he was able to construct a remote and install an antennae receiver attached to a battery on one of his diecast fire trucks. When he went to take it for a test run in the hallway, however, something happened between the two antennae, causing the fire truck to ram repeatedly into his apartment's door. The spot where the truck hit was partly splintered in the aftermath. Upset for making his parents angry, the young Huey apologized. Huey grinned. _So stupid, so naive_ , he thought to himself. Nonetheless, he had found it. Apartment 17.

Hobbling up to the door, he could feel his stomach dropping. He took a deep breath. And another. It was time. Using the foot of one of his crutches, he knocked on the door. A sweet voice came from the other side. "Just a minute!" it spoke in a sing-songy intonation and a German accent. Huey looked back towards the entrance. It wasn't too late, was it? He weighed his options. Footsteps from the other side. The doctor's finger tapping intensified. Finally, the creak.

"Hello!" greeted a short, older woman with brown curly hair and glasses standing in the doorway, "What can I do for you to-" Upon getting a good look at the man in front of her, the woman went silent, her mouth wide open. Tears formed at her eyes as she brought her frail hands to her mouth. Huey could hear the beginning of quiet sobs.

"...Hello, mom," the scientist nonchalantly greeted, "I'm here for Hal."

Suddenly, a voice from behind the woman. A child's voice. "Grammy!" it whined, "I'm hungyyyy!" Huey froze. His forehead dampened. That voice, it was… A young boy, no older than four, came walking into the doorway to the hip of the old woman. Sporting small, round-rimmed glasses and surprisingly shaggy hair for his age, the kid was easy to identify. Pouting, he looked up at the shocked old woman before looking over at the man in the hallway. The kid's eyes widened. Huey had to look away.

"Daddy?" came the child's voice with a building excitement.

* * *

 _ **OOC:** Hey, guys! I've got an announcement to make. My summer break from college is almost at an end. Starting next week, I will be spending the fall abroad in Austria to study music. As such, updates will not be as consistent as they've been these past few weeks. Rest assured, though, I will try to keep the chapters coming! I'm proud of what I've done so far and really want to keep it going for as long as I am able to. I want to thank all the people who have followed, favorited, and/or reviewed. I appreciate any and all feedback and again encourage everyone to please keep it coming!_


	4. Degradation

18:03, September 1st, 1984 - Lower East Side Manhattan, New York City, NY, USA

Hands bridged under his nose, Huey sat at the table. He'd been invited in for dinner. Potatoes and chicken. His favorite. As his mom was busy making the final preparations, his son was bouncing from place to place looking for things with which to show off. The young bespectacled kid ran up to the scientist, a piece of loose leaf paper in hand. Putting it on the table, he requested, "Daddy, look what I made!" Huey looked again. It was a stick figure drawn in red crayon. It wore glasses and its hair looked like the sides of a helmet. Meanwhile, right next to it was an amorphous blob made up of a variety of little shapes. "It's you and Robby!" the proud child explained. _Ah, yes_ , Huey thought to himself, _a Walker Gear_. He looked over at his son and gave a slight nod. The beaming kid ripped the paper off the table and ran back down the hall. Soon after, his mom set down a plate of chopped potatoes, still steaming from the oven.

"Why didn't you write?" she spoke softly, staring down into the open pot. Huey took in a deep breath and placed his hands on the table.

"C'mon, mom, don't be like that," Huey methodically responded, "You make it sound like I didn't want to contact y-"

"11 years, Huey," she interrupted sharply, turning back to the kitchen counter to grab the chicken, "I've been worried sick about you for 11 years, and that entire time, the one piece of evidence I got that told me that you were still alive was your son showing up wrapped in a blanket at my door with a note saying as much."

"It's not my fault, mom, honest!" Huey raised his voice, "The job I'd been hired for in Costa Rica, it… it led me into a decade of other projects that I was roped into. Projects that… well, that I couldn't really vacation from." Silence then fell over the dining area once more. Huey's mother, sniffing, brought a pan of chicken to the table. With a knife, she carved a few preliminary slices of the bird. The wafting aroma of spiced meat filled the air. A thought entered Huey's head. He looked to his sides and then down the hall, towards where his dad's lab was.

"Mom…" he spoke up, "Where's dad?" At this, the old woman took in a sharp breath. Setting the knife down, she again avoided eye contact and looked down at the tablecloth.

"After you'd gone," she began, voice trembling, "Friedrich, he… he changed. He grew more withdrawn, more confrontational, more… alone." Pulling out a seat from the table, Huey's mother sat down and brought a hand to her forehead. "When it was clear to him you weren't coming home soon, his grasp on sanity slipped further and further. He drank more. He hadn't drank that much since between Hiroshima and VJ Day." Huey's ears perked up. He was completely unaware of this latter fact. That stretch of time… it couldn't have been coincidence, could it?

"There were times where he would come home at 3 in the morning and pass out on the couch," his mother continued on, struggling to get the words out, "There were times where I would find him in his lab, drunkenly contemplating setting the whole room on fire. There were times where I would see him curled up in a ball in a corner, a bottle of whiskey in his hand. He was crying. 'I take it back, I take it back,' he was saying." Tears reappeared in her eyes. She slightly bit her lip. Huey, his eyes wide, gulped and shifted around in his seat.

"I'm sorry, I…" he started, "I didn't-"

"One day, seven years ago," his mother continued, her stoicism beginning to crack, "He didn't come home. I looked around the house. I asked the neighbors if they'd seen him. I called the police." Tears began to flow as her face sunk further into the palm of her hand. "They found his body on the shores of the Hudson... He'd jumped from the George Washington Bridge…" she could hardly get out through sobs. Huey was speechless. He looked on at his weeping mother, feeling a strong compulsion to get up and comfort her. He thought back to his childhood, to his brown-bearded father working ever so diligently on his research. Dr. Friedrich Emmerich, the great nuclear scientist. Dr. Friedrich Emmerich, the harbinger of death. A question emerged.

"Mom…" Huey piped up when it was apparent she could speak no further, "Everything you told me about dad when I was a kid - that he was a hero, that he saved countless American soldiers from death in Japan - you knew you were twisting the truth, didn't you? I was born the day Little Boy dropped. You knew I was gonna find out about the aftermath of the bombings eventually. So why did you sugarcoat everything?"

As her sobs lessened, the elder Emmerich put her hand down on the table and continued looking straight ahead at the wall. She inhaled deeply and shook her head. "I didn't do it for you," she confessed plainly, "I did it for him."

"For-" Huey, bewildered, sputtered. It wasn't enough that his father knowingly did what he did, but he had to try and justify it to help him sleep better at night? No, Dr. Friedrich Emmerich was no hero. He was a villain and even he knew it. A strange ache rang out in Huey's head, but he paid it little mind.

"The food's getting cold," Huey's mother stated matter-of-factly, "I should get the plates and silverware." With that, she rose from her chair, wiped her eyes, and moved over to a set of cabinets. Pulling out three plates, she cried out, "Hal! Dinner time!"

"Yaaaaaay!" came the kid's cheerful voice at the end of the hall. Like a ball of energy, the youth bounded down the hall completely oblivious to the room's mood. Huey buried himself in his thoughts once more as his mother brought silverware and plates to the table. His son, trapped in a constant state of amazement, cooed over the steaming pot of potatoes. At last, the family was all seated at the dinner table. Silence save for the chewing of food and the humming of the child lingered in the air.

"So," Huey's mother spoke a few minutes into the meal, her voice a bit less somber and accusative now, "you said something at the door earlier. Something about coming for Hal. Why?"

"Starting tomorrow," Huey replied, "I'll be working somewhere quite a ways away. This past year Hal and I spent apart for reasons beyond my control, and I hated every second of it. He's my son, and I don't want to miss a single moment more of his growth."

"Where are you going?" she asked in response flatly. Huey looked over at the black TV screen on the other side of the room. How long had they had that TV? Its wooden rims looked cracked, the paint on the dials looked worn, and it was absolutely puny. It must have come from the 50s-

"...Tennessee," Huey replied after a moment as memories of Elvis on Ed Sullivan flashed across his mind, "Memphis, Tennessee."

"Oh, how fun," his mother grinned, "What for?"

Huey sighed and stared down at the table. "My old friends at NASA recently hired me to aid them in space shuttle development at the Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University," he explained, grabbing his fork, "Ever since Columbia, they've been itching to improve on its design." His mother nodded in response.

"How long will you be working down there?" she came again, concern once again seeping into her tone.

His attention focused on skewering a potato, Huey stated, "I'm not sure. Could be a few months. Could be a year. Those NASA types, they're very particu-"

"I would like to know a specific time," his mother sternly cut off, looking straight at the scientist. Huey again sighed.

"Mom, I'm not going to vanish again," he assured her, "I promise you that. I'll write, I'll call… I'll try to visit. Just… please let me take care of Hal from here on out." He ate a potato. Just barely warm enough. "You've done more than enough already," he added, "and I can't thank you enough. Let me take it from here." Huey's mother stared down at the table. Silence, then, for the rest of the meal, except for the occasional interjection of the boy to tell his father an outlandish tale involving imaginary friends only for his grandmother to tell him to sit back and stop hunching over the table please or he would make a mess of his clothes. Just as he was getting around to his last few potatoes, Huey looked up at the clock hanging over the kitchen sink. His eyes jolted open a little as he realized that he only had four minutes left.

"I'm sorry," he said pushing his plate away and looking for his crutches, "I need to go. I have someone waiting for me downst-"

"You can take Hal with you," interrupted his mother at a near hush, her eyes finally meeting his again. A smile spread across Huey's face. He reached for his crutches so that he could get up and thank her. "Only…" she told him further, "Please come visit." Huey looked into her eyes. Gone was the anger and disappointment present twenty-so minutes ago, now replaced by… resignation and fear. It was a beckoning look. Huey had to look away.

"I will, mom," he assured her, "I will." Another silence. Then, Huey's mother rose from the table.

"I will get his clothes," she spoke, walking away and leaving father and son together. As Huey reached for his crutches again to get up, his son gazed back and forth between the two giants in wonder. Huey noticed and abashedly grinned.

He chuckled. "You excited, Hal?" he asked, "You and daddy are going to have the best time together. Our lives will be… normal!" At this, the child only giggled, as though his father's presence alone was making him happy. Huey himself chuckled a bit after heaving a sigh and heaved himself up. He had succeeded again. Looking up at the clock, he watched the hands shift further and further downwards while nervously tapping his crutch. Finally, he could hear footsteps coming from the other end of the apartment. His mother approached, carrying with her a moderately-sized brown sack. Her face was slightly redder, especially around the eyes. Sniffing, she handed off the bag to Hal and then pat him on the head.

"You be good now, okay, Hal?" she spoke, slightly trembling, "Don't cause too much trouble for your father. He loves you very much, I can see." Speaking these words, her tone grew softer. The boy nodded. As Huey's mother got up, she stared right at her son for a moment. Then, face trembling, she approached him and gave him a tight hug. They stood there for what seemed like forever. "Huey," she finally spoke, her voice wavering, "please do stop in for a visit when you can, alright?" More sniffling.

"I will, mom," Huey repeated once more, "I will."

Finally, she let him go, moved to the door, and opened it for the both of them. Nodding at her, Huey began to hobble out the door, his son following close behind. With a final look back, the child said, "Goodbye, grammy!" At this, the woman's head dropped into her chest. She quickly shut the door. A look of confusion and worry on his face, the kid looked up at his father. "Daddy?" he asked, "Why was grammy crying?"

Huey hesitated for a moment, his thoughts still jumbled. "...It's nothing, Hal," he finally responded, "Grandma just hasn't seen daddy for a while. Come on, we need to go." With this, he moved back down the hall with his crutches and, one second later, he could hear small footsteps following him. As the pair exited the door and rounded the corner, Huey could see the black sedan which had driven him there still parked on the sidewalk. Any nerves that had flared earlier over the clock were assuaged. Approaching the right-side front car door, he tapped it with his crutch. The agent at the wheel reached over to open the door for the doctor, who got in shortly after. At his dad's urging, Hal got into the back of the car.

The agent keyed the ignition. Within a second, the car radio came to life again, the familiar jingle of American Top 40 filling the interior. Shortly after, they were off. Hal stared at the back of the agent's head in wonderment. "Daddy, who is he?" he questioned.

"Just an old friend, Hal," Huey responded reassuringly, looking back at the youth, "He'll be driving us down to our new home!" The youth grinned.

"Hello, Mr. Daddy's Friend! I'm Hal!" he greeted. The agent remained silent, killing the budding conversation. Car noises and the radio resumed their control over the ambiance. As a melancholic guitar came out of the car speakers, Huey could make out Casey Kasem speaking. "...the fewest number of foreign acts in four years," the deejay commentated, "Here's one of those seven foreign acts - Englishman John Waite, climbing three notches to number two with 'Missing You'."

" _Every time I think of you_ ," the Englishman crooned, " _I always catch my breath_ …"

The lyrics kept coming, cascading over Huey's ears. He sighed. He looked out at the street as the car stopped at a crosswalk. Just outside, a young mother wearing a red dress was crossing the street, pushing a stroller which, from his perspective, appeared to be empty. An odd feeling came over him.

"... _And there's a heart that's breaking down/this long-distance line tonight…_ "

"Daddy?" came Hal's voice from the back seat.

"What is it, Hal?" Huey replied eagerly.

"Where's mommy?"

The words entered his ears like a gunshot to the stomach. His mind temporarily went blank as he scrambled to find the words to say. _He remembers her_ , the scientist thought to himself, _he remembers Strangelove_.

" _...I ain't missing you/no matter what I may say…_ "

For a few seconds, his mouth moved without any words coming out of it. Tears came to his eyes as images of grey hair and AI pods entered his mind, but he fought them back. He took a deep breath. "...Mommy's busy, Hal," he finally answered, "She's working on something in Britain right now and won't be back for a while." Hal responded only with a simple affirmation. Huey's emotions only continued to build. As the car drove past the crosswalk, he looked back at the woman with the stroller. A gruesome panic chuckle overcame him.

" _...I ain't missing you, I ain't missing you/I can lie to myself…_ "

* * *

 _ **OOC:** Wow, it's been a while. Thank you all for bearing with me as I worked to get a new chapter out to you guys. I promise that the next chapter won't have nearly as long a wait as this one. I've been busy these past few months exploring Europe and expanding my passion for music, all at the expense of almost ignoring this story. While I'm grateful to have had this opportunity and made the most of it, I know that this wasn't fair at all to you guys and as such, I apologize. This chapter came slowly; I wrote it in pieces over my semester abroad, writing one section then putting it down for a while, coming back to it, writing another, and so forth. If I were to formalize the entire fic into parts, this chapter would mark the end of part 1. Huey's back in the states, he's working for DARPA, and now he's reunited with Hal. We still have a ways to go, though, before 1997, so strap in, dear readers - the ride's just getting started. After a brief flashback intermission (more on those later), we'll be delving further into Huey's descent._


	5. Escape

18:25, April 12th, 1984 - Afghanistan Central Base Camp, North of Kabul, Afghanistan

 _What the hell is taking so long?_ , he thought.

"Sitting down" at his desk with the help of his exoskeleton, Huey Emmerich searched through his computer for data from the previous day's tests. The AI was still bunk. It had been six months, and he still couldn't figure out how to make Sahelanthropus move like an actual living being. He'd studied Strangelove's notes closely, attempting to make further modifications to the AI based on them, but unfortunately for him, artificial intelligence wasn't rocket science. The Mammal Pod refused to cooperate with him, sometimes shutting entire sections of itself off just as the doctor was making edits to them and other times unleashing a distorted female scream as he even approached. It had been like that for the past six months and he could not figure out why.

At last, the doctor reached the file containing the test results and accessed it with a simple press of the enter button. He grunted. It read like a progress report for physical therapy. The mech, while upright, could move its head and arms at the same time, but only along horizontal and vertical axes respectively. It could take steps, but would return to a neutral position after each one. Huey craned his neck back at the Mammal Pod on the other side of his lab.

And yet, none of it would matter soon. At least he hoped. Every night for the past few days, he'd sent out distress calls using a makeshift two-way radio he'd assembled from scrap, patching into the base camp's own radio frequency to do so. He'd heard talk among the Soviets about a new upstart PMC that had been causing their troops trouble in recent weeks by the name Diamond Dogs. On one or two occasions, he even heard rumors of the Legendary Soldier himself stalking the Afghan deserts: Big Boss. Snake. _No, no, it can't be_ , Huey thought to himself again, _he died nine years ago when…_

The scientist shook his head. Regardless of what was true and what was not surrounding this new PMC, he'd decided to play a gambit and reach out to them, beaming a signal to the same frequency he'd become familiar with for MSF nine years ago - 141.80 - perhaps in response to these rumors. He only hoped that his messages would be heard. For the past few weeks Skull Face had been… tense, to say the least. Each weekly meeting with the masked man in recent times was marked by frustration, anger, and arguments over how quickly the weapon would be operational. It was reaching a point where Huey was feeling more uncertain about the future of his captivity than he had in years. If things continued like this… Huey shuddered.

The automatic door at the side of his lab opened. Two XOF soldiers, decked out in their full black body armor and carrying their assault rifles, marched into the room, towards Huey's desk. "Dr. Emmerich, it's time for the weekly inspection," one of them announced to him, "Please, follow us." The compliant doctor nodded his head and, with a few whirs and clicks from his exoskeleton, he was upright and following the soldiers out the door. The crimson Afghan sun, nearing the bottom of the horizon, painted the side exit of his facility with a multitude of shadows and darker shades. Right in front of the three of them was a two-jeep convoy - one already filled with other XOF operatives and the other with Skull Face himself sitting in the back. The masked man, noticing the doctor approaching, gestured towards the other empty seat in the back. Taking a deep breath, the doctor climbed into the back with him and sat.

"Any progress?" the masked man instantly pressed. The XOF soldier in the front seat started the car and began driving. Huey nervously looked to the side.

"I can't really say," Huey replied, "I've managed to get the robot stepping with the AI control, but just that. It isn't ready to actually start walking." At this, Skull Face grunted.

"I really can't understand your preoccupation with AI recently, doctor," he condescended, "It's like these past few months, you've been revisiting Costa Rica in your mind. You were making such great headway with your son late last year and now, just because he's gone, you feel the need to just drop the notion of Sahelanthropus as a manned weapon like a sack of potatoes."

"Hey, AI does work," Huey retorted, "You can say my mind is stuck in Costa Rica all you want, but those machines - Pupa, Chrysalis, and the like - were a landmark achievement in unmanned weaponry."

"But were they built to walk upright?" Skull Face countered. The convoy had left the base camp. The sky, ever fading in its color, lay stretched out over the open Afghan countryside by the road. Huey, at Skull Face's response, began to sweat slightly. The masked man grinned. "You've had nine years to figure this out," he mockingly scolded Emmerich, "Yes, nine years to build a functional upright weapon, and yet, all we have right now is an over-glorified monument to military excess."

"Well, it doesn't help that all my avenues of tackling this problem are so hard to navigate on my own!" Huey defended himself.

"And whose fault is that, Doctor?" Skull Face shot back maliciously, "I didn't recruit you to program an AI for Sahelanthropus. I brought Strangelove on board for that." He leaned in. "But she's no longer with us, now is she?" he grimly finished. Huey squirmed.

"I-I…" he stuttered, but then regained his composure, "...Look, the point is that I'm working as hard as I can to find the solution in my circumstances. Give me a break, would you?" At this, the masked man reared his head in laughter. Slapping his knee, his head sunk into his chest. Huey tugged his collar slightly.

"I've given you one break too many," the greyskulled cowboy growled, glaring menacingly up at the nervous scientist, "And yet, you still continue to disappoint me." Slightly tipping his hat, he looked back on the darkening sky. Huey could say nothing in response. Instead, he just looked down at the truck bed. "I had better see some results today, doctor," Skull Face continued, "For your sake."

For the rest of the ride, the two men sat in a tense silence. The jeep sped along the dusty valleys, bumping and shaking from the gravel roadways underneath. It was a route that had become familiar to Huey - two Soviet checkpoints and then Serak. As they passed the first, the doctor thought to look up at Skull Face, but regretted his decision almost instantly. The masked man was staring right at Huey as though wanting to bore a hole right through his head. His eyes, his blueish-grey eyes, were filled with a burning intensity. Was it hatred? Was it disgust? Huey didn't stare back long enough to tell. He looked out at the passing road. The second checkpoint was coming up. Soviet soldiers, ever vigilant in their watch, patrolled the area. Huey noticed one of them approach another and point to the convoy. The other soldier, perhaps a commander, nodded and went back to his patrolling. Soon after that, XOF was through.

Huey felt a warm wind blow. He'd hoped that he'd been clear in his transmissions about his routine. Wake-up time every morning at 8 o'clock. Working in the lab from then until 6:30 in the evening. Transportation from Central Base Camp to Serak Power Plant. Testing robots until 11 at night. Back to Central Base Camp. Surely, the Diamond Dogs would be able to locate him somewhere during the day, but up until then… They hadn't. _Is something wrong?_ , Huey wondered. Then his mind wandered to other worries. _If they don't come, what then? Has XOF picked up on my transmissions yet? What will happen to me if I get caught?_ He took a deep breath and straightened his tie.

"You seem troubled, doctor," the voice of Skull Face came, snapping Huey out of his thoughts. He looked around. By the looks of things, their little convoy was approaching the entrance to the power plant. The troubled doctor cleared his throat and looked back at his boss. The greyfaced man was still staring him down with the same intensity.

"I'm fine," Huey replied reassuringly. Skull Face grunted in response.

"Suit yourself," he dismissed in an unconvinced tone; he looked downwards and away from the doctor at last. The encroaching darkness of night time further obscured the cowboy's face from underneath his fedora. The two descended further into the plant, passing through the gateway to the cliffside hangar.

The hangar area was sparsely lit, the lights too few to reach the top of the cavern. As was usual for Skull Face's weekly inspections, it was brimming with XOF. Soldiers stalked the scene, keeping a watchful eye over any sign of intruders. Technicians hovered near the furthest wall, awaiting further orders. As soon as the two jeeps pulled up to the rightmost scaffolding, a pair of soldiers approached to check on the passengers. Spotting their boss in the back of their second jeep, the two soldiers slung their rifles and saluted. Skull Face, jumping from the back of the truck, waved them off.

"Bring it out, boys!" he ordered to the men in the hangar, "Show me Sahelanthropus!" At this, a stir was whipped up in the hangar. Technicians scrambled to open the massive doors in the back. Soldiers in groups jogged to secure the perimeter and double down in their efforts to root out any infiltration. As Huey got up to climb out of the jeep himself, a blaring alarm was raised and red lights went on as the doors in the far back slowly slid open to the tune of grinding metal. Behind them, at first, was a shroud of blackness. Gradually, though, it was lifted as rows of lights came on, revealing a hunched-over, dinosaur-like mechanical beast at the far end. With a piercing, metallic shriek, the platform on which the beast sat rolled forward until it was positioned right at the entrance. Metal Gear Sahelanthropus was ready for inspection.

Skull Face and Huey gazed upon the robotic creature from the top level of the scaffolding. "Beautiful as usual," Skull Face crooned, "For all its… shortcomings with motion-" he glanced over at the doctor- "it certainly is an intimidating weapons platform." Huey, his attention focused on his creation, took in these words with pride. The rail gun, the gatling guns, the flamethrower, the missile lauchers, and once it received the archaea blades...! Oh, if only he could be there to see it. Truly, he'd achieved the perfect synthesis between infantry and artillery - a true Metal Gear. _It's unstoppable_ , he thought with a smirk. Though he thought he could have also heard Skull Face mutter something to the effect of, "Granin would be proud," he paid little mind to it. That name no longer meant anything to him. "With that being said," the masked man continued, "it would be a shame to see it rust away in here for much longer, don't you agree?" Huey, intoxicated, looked over at Skull Face, nodding his head.

Chuckling, Skull Face walked over to the doctor and placed a hand on his shoulder. "Good, good," he murmured, "Then allow me to relieve you of your testing duties, Doctor." Huey grinned and chuckled back before realizing what had been said. His smile vanished almost immediately. The world seemed to stand still. All he could see in front of him was his greyfaced superior, grinning back devilishly. All he could utter in response was a simple shellshocked, "What?"

More chuckles from the cowboy, who released his grip from Huey's shoulder. "You see, doctor," he explained, "the Soviets can't wait anymore. The new General Secretary Chernenko is planning another offensive, this one even larger than the last. Moscow is desperate to launch one large knockout blow against the Mujahideen. They need Sahelanthropus." Huey struggled to find the words to say, in response, attempting to sputter that the weapon wasn't ready, but Skull Face cut him off. "Doctor, let me assure you," he interrupted, "I know perfectly well what this weapon is capable of. That's why I personally am assuming control of testing. The time is right for it to earn a baptism by fire in the wild expanse of Afghanistan." Confused, the disquieted doctor looked at Skull Face with disbelief. How could he know what Sahelanthropus could do if it hadn't even moved past the han- Just as he thought it over, it hit him. A few days ago, during one of the Sahelanthropus tests, he could see the slightest specks of dirt on the machine's feet. He'd thought nothing of it then, but what if…

His mind racing, Huey finally shot back at Skull Face. "Just a minute!" he asserted himself, "This isn't what we agreed on!" Another truck, rolling in with yet more XOF soldiers, parked itself in the hangar. Skull Face faced away from the doctor.

"The changes have already been finalized," he dismissed in a huff.

"I-It's not operational yet!" Huey pressed on, "The remote piloting and AI control haven't reached the application stage!" _Right?_ , he thought to himself, _I'm not going crazy, am I?_ His face had heated up somewhat.

"Who said anything about an AI...?" Skull Face replied with an annoyed tone, "That was Coldman's mistake ten years ago."

"Be that as it may," Huey partly conceded, "we'll need to modify postural control to accommodate a human pilot." The scientist turned back around to face his mechanical behemoth. "I share your urgency, but..." he reassured Skull Face. He thought back to the previous year's tests, how much data he'd gained from his son, how on-track the robot seemed to completion before… Frustrated, he finished, "We need more time to finish it!" Looking over his creation again, Huey kept pondering the greyskulled cowboy's words. _I know perfectly well what this weapon is capable of_ … All he had seen, as far as Huey knew, were a few botched motion tests, maybe a few things related to its arsenal, and that was it, unless… He clenched one of his fists. Has the bastard been going behind his-

The scientist felt himself jolt forward slightly, as though someone had bumped into him. "Planning on leaving us, Doctor…? Huh…?" spoke the gravelly voice from behind him. Sweat. Fear. Huey turned around, stunned. They had found him out. As he tried to pull the words to say in response out of thin air, he made eye contact with his masked superior. The question had finally been answered: it was hatred behind those eyes. Aggressively, the masked man gripped Huey's shoulders and turned him around. "I'm taking your legs back!" Skull Face growled. Then… Huey was flying. Something about all this was familiar. Flashback to 1974. Crater Base. The tri-wheeled wheelchair tumbling down the stairs with him. Hot Coldman at the top of the steps, flashing the "V for Victory" sign. The reason why was no longer clear to him. But now, here he was, sent flying down another set of stairs by a superior. Time moved slowly for him at first. He felt, oddly enough, at ease. Then, the first bump. A stair edge jabbed into his back. Pain. Then, another and another and so forth. More pain. Had his bladder been this full the past few minutes? The pain kept coming. Eventually, it stopped.

There he lie on the cold, hard asphalt, his exoskeleton malfunctioning. A warm sensation overtook his loins as he looked up and saw Skull Face descending the staircase. Breathing rapidly, Huey's vision went blurry with panic. They had found him out. What now? "So you're just going to… kill me?" he demanded to know from the masked man. But Skull Face just kept walking down the stairs.

"Sahelanthropus is mine, now," he intoned in a braggadocious manner. _Like hell it is, you son-of-a-bitch_ , Huey thought to himself, preparing to sock him in the jaw if it came to it. But his train of thought was suddenly interrupted by the pain of the masked man kneeling on his abdomen and yanking his tie. "Listen," Skull Face hissed through his teeth pulling the doctor in close, his eyes burning with rage, "I may dwell in the dark, but I refuse to be judged by your standards, _traitor_!" With that, he threw the disheveled doctor back down and stood up. "I hope your 'friends' give you what's coming to you," he added with a hint of menace. Huey, moaning in pain, was shocked. No sooner after that did a robotic arm flip Huey over and yank him up by the back of his exoskeleton. Scared, the doctor looked out of the corner of his eye to see what had grabbed him. A Walker Gear. "Take him to the base," Skull Face ordered its pilot, who responded affirmatively. In a moment, the Walker Gear was off, running out of the hangar into the darkness with its captive.

* * *

Afghanistan Central Base Camp, three hours later

What was he still doing alive? Listlessly scrolling through his test files, Huey rapidly tapped his exoskeleton's leg. Wasn't Skull Face angry at him? _Traitor._ The word continued to persist in the doctor's mind. _Traitor._ He'd been called a lot of things in his life, but never that. People had called him a lot of negative things in his life, but... _Traitor._ It simply wasn't true. Had he not done everything Skull Face asked of him? Had he not built the greatest weapons platform of all time? Had he not gone the extra distance to try and complete the robot as soon as possible? A scowl crossing his face, the doctor, with a grunt, buried his head in his arms.

What was going to happen to him now? If Skull Face wasn't going to kill him, what was he going to do? The doctor wracked his brain for answers. Would he still work, but just kept under a tighter watch? They'd smashed his radio. They'd tightened security in the area around his lab. Would he be tortured, bled for the rest of the knowledge needed to finish Sahelanthropus? Skull Face was an evil bastard - Huey could certainly see that as a possibility. None of the outcomes that he could think of were net positives, in any case. Inhaling, he "sat up." He took a look at his computer monitor once more. Since returning, he'd considered more than once just deleting all the test files. He'd clack the keys, getting closer and closer each time to removing them but… he couldn't go through with it. His curiosity egged him on.

Just as Huey reached for his keyboard again, he heard a door open and then… Nothing. No heavy boots, no clanking armor, nothing. Just the hum of the AI pod in the background. _Curious_ , he thought. Perhaps one of the guards had accidentally ventured too close to the entrance? He returned to his keyboard, scrolling through the list of test files once again. His hands began to tremble just slightly. The doctor started at his monitor but found he was barely able to concentrate on it. Suddenly, the AI pod spoke up, making Huey jump slightly. "Who are you?" it asked. Confused and slightly on edge, Huey craned his neck so that he could look behind him at the pod. There, he could see, was the pod aglow with red lights and some sort of soldier standing next to it, pistol drawn. "Snake…?" the pod piped up again with a softer, more melancholic tone, "It's not you… is it?" _Snake?!_ Huey thought, a tingle running down his spine, _He's dead, though! He's-_ The doctor took a deep breath.

"Hey!" he called to the soldier by the AI pod, "It's just a machine." Just barely, he began to hear the sound of little footsteps pacing towards his desk. Whoever this person was clearly had access to state-of-the-art stealth technology. The evident conclusion continued to persist in his mind, but he refused to believe it. Instead, he "stood up" and turned to face the approaching soldier. The more that the soldier entered the dim lighting by his desk, the more the pieces fell into place. A ragged beard. Long, brown hair. An eyepatch. One of the most impressive physiques he'd ever seen. The doctor's stomach sank, yet he felt positively giddy. Still… Something didn't add up. There were scars on his face and… this black horn in his forehead. A demon's horn. "...Are you…?" he carefully started.

"Dr. Emmerich," the soldier spoke. _That voice_ , Huey thought. It was a voice that could have only been honed through years of smoking, fighting, and suffering. It was unmistakeable. Unbelievable as it was, the man in front of him was a phantom raised from the dead. The face of MSF that had gone down with his ship nine years ago. The Legendary Soldier…

"Snake?" the shocked scientist gawked. Here was his salvation. Here was his judgement. He was going to be free. He was going to be-

Blackness. Suffocation.

* * *

 _ **OOC:** Hey, all! Took a bit longer to get this chapter out than I'd anticipated, but I hope you guys enjoy it! This is the first of a few "flashback" chapters I intend to include in the story. Basically, every four chapters or so, I'm going to throw in another chapter centering around an event that occurred during Huey's captivity between 1975 and 1984 in reverse chronological order, the idea being that as we see the older Huey (that is, 1984 to 1997 Huey) put increasingly under siege for the walls he has erected around himself, we follow at the same time the younger Huey, seeing a sort of reverse transition from the sociopathic sycophant that he was in Phantom Pain to the younger, more idealistic proponent of nuclear deterrence that he was in Peace Walker, culminating in... Well, that'll come later. As for what's next, we're going to be diving right into the second part of the story and seeing Huey adjust to normal life again, all while raising a young Hal. Look forward to it!_


	6. Folly

Time unknown - Location unknown, Arlington, Virginia

Another busy day. While mentally taxing, there was something rewarding to Huey Emmerich about his new job at DARPA. He was truly glad to be in such an environment once more, helping to design robots, propulsion systems, and other such technology. As he sat in his reclining chair reflecting on his day, his eyes rested on the TV. Jeopardy had just come on, which made the scientist happy; he'd remembered making a hobby of watching the show nightly and trying to answer every clue correctly while working for NASA in the 60s. He usually failed at most categories that didn't have anything to do with science. That the show kept in syndication for another ten years while he was gone pleasantly surprised the doctor, although the personnel had changed. Not that he was complaining - this new Alex person they'd brought on board seemed more than capable of filling Art Fleming's shoes.

Footsteps approached from his left. In a moment, he could see in his peripheral a white button down and grey pants. Huey smiled. "The Earl Gray's done," reported a voice with a British accent, "I've got you a cup here and more in the kettle if you want it." With a chuckle, the doctor turned his torso to face the figure - his dear wife, Strangelove. He reached for the cup and plucked it from the tray the grey-haired woman was carrying with careful precision.

"Thanks, dear," he said with a smile, "How was your day?"

"Oh, you know," Strangelove sighed, moving over to the tea table to place down the tray, "Busy as usual. CSNET is just about operational, so we're getting ready to hand it off to BBN."

Huey sighed. "I still think the NSF is underusing you, dear," he told her, leaning back in his chair, "Here you are, one of the preeminent AI scientists of our time, and you're just helping to create networks. It's like hiring Dr. Frankenstein to pitch a tent." Blushing slightly, Strangelove chuckled and looked to the side.

"It's not the ideal situation, certainly," she agreed, "but anything's better than Afghanistan." The doctor vigorously nodded, guffawing nervously. "How was yours?" she asked him.

"About the same," Huey replied, blankly facing the TV again, "Worked a bunch more on ground-interception tech today. After picking up Hal from daycare, I've just been sitting here s-" Something had caught his eye, all of a sudden. Focusing on his TV screen, he read the question that had just popped up. The host spoke.

"After aiding XOF in the destruction of Mother Base in 1975, this scientist would go on to murder his own lover as well as create weapons platform Metal Gear Sahelanthropus, which nearly caused an international crisis last year," Alex read. Huey couldn't breathe. Seeing the white text over top of the blue background made his stomach churn. The camera cut to the contestants, each one standing behind their podium and thinking. Finally, one buzzed in.

"Who is Hubert Emmerich?" she asked. Suddenly, a loud thud to his side. Huey jumped and looked over in the direction of the sound. Standing there with a snide grin on his face was none other than Ocelot. Spinning a Colt SAA, he was chuckling. At his feet was the unconscious body of Dr. Strangelove, blood oozing out of the back of her head.

"It was just like that, wasn't it?" the Russian mused with his trademark drawl, "Coldcocked her right upside the back of the head. Of course, you didn't use the butt of a gun, but there's no need to sweat over the minor details."

"You!" Huey yelled at the devilish apparition. He attempted to jump up from his chair, but soon found that both his arms and feet were bound to the couch with metal. Panic ran through the doctor's mind.

"What's your hurry, son?" Ocelot asked Huey, "Stay a while, won't you. Let's catch up on old times." The Russian cowboy approached him, his spurs clicking sharply with every step. While doing so, he still maintained the spin on his revolver with the greatest of ease. Sweat coated Huey's forehead as he struggled to find the words to say.

"H-How…" the shocked scientist stammered, "H-H-How did y-you find me?! I-I'm in witness protection! Th-there's n-n-no way you should know where I am!"

"Ah, I see," Ocelot realized, a gloved finger reaching up to cover his chin, "You seem to be mistaken, Emmerich. I'm not actually here right now. Diamond Dogs still doesn't know where you are - at least, as far as I know. Really, I'm just going off what you know."

Feeling like insanity had taken hold of him, the doctor asked in a low, nervous tone, "W-what do you mean by all that? You're not here? Wh-"

"I'm a figment of your imagination, doctor," the Russian explained, "though I would say that's a pretty limited descriptor. I know all of what you know. I remember all of what you remember. I'd prefer to think of myself as…" He trailed off, looking back at his still-spinning revolver. With a sudden snap, the revolver was gripped in his hand, facing the ceiling. "...Your conscience," he finished.

"I-Impossible, I-" Huey continued to stammer, looking at the floor.

"Impossible? Hah!" Ocelot guffawed, "You say that like you expected to come out of years of war, of interrogation, of torture, with an uncompromised mental state. Like it wouldn't follow you for the rest of your life. Au contraire, doctor - war changes men." Huey softly moaned. Just when he thought he was free to live happily, just when he thought he was out of hell... Tears formed at his eyes as he stewed in a building anger. "Nice place you got here," Ocelot purred, "Very tasteful with the decoration." Huey looked up to see the infernal cat surveying the living room. "This is your ideal life, isn't it?" he asked, "A nice, suburban home. One and a half kids. Strangelove. Is that right?"

"Leave me alone…" the doctor choked out with a slight hint of menace.

"I'm gonna go ahead and assume that's a yes," Ocelot replied, "but, well… you know you could never have that."

"I KNOW SHE'S DEAD!" Huey shouted abruptly, catching the Russian off guard. He gazed into the doctor's eyes bemused. Breathing in, the doctor continued. "...I know she's dead…!" he came again, this time more labored, "You don't need to remind me…" Ocelot, shaking his head, sighed.

" _I'm_ not doing anything, Doctor," Ocelot dismissed, taking a seat on the coffee table right in front of the scientist, "Besides, that's not what I'm getting at." Confused and scared, Huey wanted so badly to look away. All the while, though, some sort of force was keeping his eyes glued to the cowboy.

"Then what the hell else are you talking about…?" he pushed.

"Oh, come on, doc!" the Russian teased, "Use that good ol' NASA-worthy brain of yours for once!" The doctor, enraged again, clenched his fists. He was basting in sweat. Chuckling, Ocelot continued, "Did you seriously believe that, after what she saw of you in Afghanistan, after all the morally-corrupt decisions you made in the name of science, that the two of you would just board a 747 back to the States and live happily ever after?"

The red hot anger that the doctor had felt just moments before vanished. Chills shot down his spine as memories entered his mind. Memories of… No. No. No, none of it was true. He was being lied to. They had Hal together. They were an unstoppable scientific duo. The way their lives had intertwined… it was fate. It was fate. Tears that had been leaking moments before were now pouring out, yet the distressed doctor did not sob. The Russian cowboy sucked his teeth and looked away.

"No, Emmerich," he spoke, "The truth is, what happened to her is exactly what happened to the rest of your former comrades. She saw you for what you truly were."

"SHUT UP!" a tear-stained Huey shot back, more out of lamentation than rage, "When we were in Afghanistan, we- we-"

"Why did you kill her, Emmerich?" Ocelot interrupted, "Oh, and also, why did you use her son, _your_ son as a test subject for Sahelanthropus?"

"I-I di-" Huey tried to deny, but was interrupted by Ocelot holding up his hand.

"Spare me your bullshit and answer me," the Russian growled, "It can't have all been in the name of science. No, there was some deeper motivation behind it. A jealousy. A jealously that manifested itself in rage, in destruction, is that right?" The scientist silently wept. He'd had enough. He wanted out. He wanted out. He wanted- "You're as goddamn hopeless as ever, Emmerich," Ocelot sighed, rolling his eyes.

"I-If you're my conscience," Huey mumbled despondently, "if you already know what I know, remember what I remember - w-why the hell are you asking me...?"

"Because I wanna hear you say it," the cowboy replied without hesitation, shooting the doctor a glare. He stood up again, towering over the restrained doctor. "Your entire life since MSF has been spent creating problems, weaseling your way out of them, creating more problems, weaseling out of them again, and so on," he seethed, "But you never want to acknowledge that you're the one creating the problems. You always dismiss. You always deflect. You always lie. And the damndest thing?" The cowboy raised his revolver right at the doctor's face. Tremors shook the doctor's body. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see the crotch area of his pants dampen. "You believe every word of what you say," the Russian continued, "And do you know why, Emmerich?"

Huey refused to respond. Instead, he once again raised his voice, yelling at his interrogator, "SHUT UP! GET OUT OF MY HEAD! GO AWAY!" He closed his eyes and shook his head, but he could still feel the Russian's presence right in front of him.

"Because," Ocelot answered for Huey, cocking his weapon, "you're a coward." Bang.

* * *

02:35, February 14th, 1985 - "Phillips" residence, Arlington, Virginia

"NO!" screamed Huey at the top of his lungs as he bolted upright. Panting heavily, he scrambled to find his bearings. He was in his room again, almost pitch black save for the areas that could be illuminated by moonlight. Still, without his glasses, everything was a dark blur. The bedspace in front of him seemed to stretch on for ages. He reached up to touch his face. Wetness. Another tear rolled down his cheek. All of what had happened just now, it… was it a dream? In his awed state of mind, he found it hard to determine.

Suddenly, from outside his door, he could hear the sounds of a young boy crying. _Hal?_ , the disheveled doctor thought to himself. Acting quickly, he fumbled for his glasses on the nightstand next to him. Once he put them on, he noticed a shadow by his doorway. Sweat coated his forehead. He cleared his throat slightly before proceeding. "H-Hal?" he asked, stammering, to the crying figure at the doorway, "Is th-that you?"

"Daddyyyy…" came the voice, followed by more sobs. Internally, Huey exhaled a slight sigh of relief, knowing that it was his son on the other side of that door. Still, the sobbing persisted.

"What's wrong, Hal?" he inquired softly to his son, "Come here." The door slowly creaked open and timidly, the young boy with the long brown hair walked into the room, still crying slightly.

"There was a monster… and he was in my closet… and he jumped out at me… And then I wanted to be with Daddy… and then I heard Daddy yell… And…" the little kid rambled through tiny tears, clinging onto a stuffed wolf doll that his dad had gotten for him just weeks prior.

"It's okay, buddy," Huey reassuringly told his son with a smile, "Come here. Daddy's here for you." Hesitantly, the boy walked over to him and crawled under the covers next to his father. "It was just a bad dream, Hal," he whispered, giving his son a hug, "There aren't any monsters anywhere. Not in your closet, not in your room, not in this house. Not on my watch."

"But what about the monsters outside?" Hal asked through sniffles. Huey briefly froze. What could he say? That monsters did exist? That the world was full of them? That he… No.

"Hal…" the doctor started with a weary-but-reassuring grin, "As long as you're around daddy, no monsters are gonna hurt you. I'll protect you forever."

"Daddy…" the young kid replied, "Can you sing like Grammy does?" Huey, taken aback, stuttered. His eyes widened slightly. It was… a new sensation come over him.

"I…" he responded, a pressure building in his eyes, "Yes… Hal, I would love to, but I… I'm afraid I don't know any songs…"

"Aw, come on, daddy!" Hal whined slightly. The youth shifted around slightly, as though he himself was looking for something to sing. Suddenly, his soprano-like voice emerged. " _Guten abend, gut' nacht…_ " the youth sang with amateurish German diction. A warm feeling built up in his father's chest as the words brought him back to a different time and place. He was back in the apartment, a boy resting in bed after a long day of playing while a womanly figure hovered over him, singing to him the sweetest melody he'd ever heard.

" _Mit rosen bedacht…_ " Huey continued, the lyrics popping back into his head.

" _Mit Näglein besteckt/Schlüpf unter die Deck'..._ " the two Emmerichs continued on. As Huey sang through the memory with his son, the warm feeling he'd felt earlier was… comforting. As if he himself had needed this more than Hal. Whoever had taught him these words was slowly receding into the back of his mind, and yet… something within him was trying desperately to hold on, to maintain that connection. Water entered his field of vision again. He could hear his son occasionally dipping out of the song and then re-entering briefly, sleep clearly taking hold of him. By the time they'd gotten through the rest of the verse, he was the only one still awake. The boy had nuzzled into his side.

Huey, being careful not to make any sudden motions to wake his kid up, reclined back into his pillow, removed his glasses, and placed them gently back on his nightstand. Although his vision was blurry again, he peeked down at his sleeping son and could not help but crack a wide smile. He gazed blankly at the ceiling. So what if his life wasn't his preconceived ideal? He still had a son. He still had a house. There were… always more women out there for him to pursue. His smile quivered slightly. As far as he was concerned, he could see himself through the rest of his civilian life just fine under these circumstances. He pulled the covers over his torso. Everything was right with his world. Everything was fine.

Wasn't it?

* * *

 **Author's Notes:** _Happy Easter, dear readers! So, finally, in this chapter, the reason as to why Ocelot is tagged in this fic is made clear. Some of the most poignant scenes/dialogues from Phantom Pain, to me, were during the interrogation sequences where Ocelot and Kaz would grill the everloving shit out of Huey and steadily break him down piece by piece. Of course, interrogation like that doesn't just leave a man's psyche, so, from the outset, I planned to have Ocelot continue to follow Huey around for the rest of his life, haunting him, in a sense, the way his father did Snake in MGS3. Expect to see him make further appearances in later chapters as the weight of what Huey has done continues to plague him. A big thanks to everyone still following this story and, once again, any and all feedback is greatly appreciated!_


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